Why it's too early for AlphaTauri to consider releasing de Vries

By:

Jake Boxall-Legge

May 16, 2023, 12:54 PM

OPINION: Only five rounds into the 2023 Formula 1 season, the driver axe is already being sharpened. By his own admission, it hasn’t been the start to life as a full-time grand prix racing driver Nyck de Vries had envisaged. But both AlphaTauri and parent squad Red Bull need to show patience to a driver who can help on multiple fronts

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Imagine enduring years of being overlooked for a Formula 1 drive, despite a glittering CV. Finally, that opportunity does come along. But then, five races into that belated F1 career, stories suggest that there’s a risk of dropping off the grid once again, amid a difficult start with a capricious car. This is Nyck de Vries’ F1 tenure in a nutshell, if recent chatter is to be believed.

There’s no escaping that de Vries’ start to life with AlphaTauri has been less than felicitous, and the Dutchman has yet to reach the benchmark he set in 2022 during his Monza cameo for Williams in place of Alex Albon, where he made the points with ninth. By contrast, the opening quintet of races has been scoreless, while the usual rookie growing pains with uncompetitive machinery have escalated somewhat in the gruelling Baku-Miami double-header.

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Jake Boxall-Legge

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Jake studied engineering at university, as his original ambition was to design racing cars. He was bad at that, and thus decided to write about them instead with an equally limited skillset. The above article is a demonstration of that. In his spare time, Jake enjoys people, places, and things.